Page Eleven

My New Year's Resolution? To have only twelve pages to do on issue #10 in the New Year. One page shy of that, and a day and a half left to make it happen.

Here, Abby asks Mark how he came up with the name "Crusader." His story is actually based on a chapter of my life: He says that it was the name of his grade school's mascot. I'm a proud graduate of Immaculate Conception Grade School, and we were the I.C. Raiders. I did a strip in grade school called Laser Raiders (based heavily on Dynamite Magazine's Dynamite Duo) and then later a little book called Raider.

The reason he has to specify grade school is that it's established that Mark went to my High School here in Ohio, Lake Catholic. There, we were the Cougars.

As for how I came up with "Crusader" for the hero of my strip? Two factors: The main inspiration is that frequent Batman sobriquet "Caped Crusader." The other was a legal and financial reason: The Crusader is a name is common usage, and as such, not really copyrightable. You can name a car "The Nova" but you can't copyright the name "Nova." And, while I'm sure there have been characters named The Crusader, there's nothing to stop me from using it, too.

Now, there might be issues with naming the book "The Crusader", but you'll notice that none of the character's names appear on the book. It's called Love and Capes, and I did do my trademark and copyright search on that.

It also means that should LnC ever become a sitcom or movie, and there's some other legal reason to change a character's name, it wouldn't affect the title of the show. See, always thinkin'.

Page Ten

What? Who's talking to Darkblade? Is it Mark? Or is it someone else?

With this page, I've run out of paved road. I had the issue planned out until this point, and now I'm left with vague "write something funny" guideposts. I've got the ending pretty tight, which is normal. I always have the ending in mind when I start the story, so that I have a target to aim for. Some of the staging is a little sketchy at this point, but I know how it's going to wrap.

If I can do two more pages this month (and yes, I know I'm running out of month) I'll be exactly on schedule for where I should be on this issue. That's all the more impressive when you realize I have a month less to get this one done than I do on most issues. We'll see if I can keep up that pace.

Ho Ho Ho

Santa stopped by Zahlerdu yesterday bringing presents to all the good girls and boys. Oddly, none for me. I knew I shouldn't have tried to sell my Council Seat on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange.

I love Christmas Eve. It's one of the few times my house is full of people. It's fun having that kind of energy, and especially the sounds of kids running and playing. Uncle Thom's place seems to be a pretty cool place for them, too. After all, I've got a ton of toys and Superman stuff and comics. This year I made coloring books for everyone, too. I just wish I had remembered to put my Spider-Man Web-Shooter up a little higher. There was a bit of a silly string incident.

Oh well, that's what it's all about.

More Christmas festivities on tap for today. But I just wanted to take a minute and say Merry Christmas to everybody out there!

Color My World

I've wanted to do this for a while.

For Christmas Eve every year, I have my relatives over. Timberlake's got an arrangement with Santa so that he comes to the houses in the Village before his yearly rounds and drops off a present or two. So my house is popular with my nephews and neices and Goddaughter. And, of course, waiting for Santa is always a trial for them. I remember it was for me.

So I got the idea that I should do a coloring book for them. This desire was increased by the new Brave and the Bold series on Cartoon Network. It's a fun show, but it's also just so frakkin' pretty. The character designs are just gorgeous (thanks in large part to artist Mike Manley) and I'm trying to figure out the way those characters are built. I decided to put the two of them together and try to do some Brave and the Bold-esque coloring book illustrations.

Some of them came out really well and are shown here. The actual coloring book breakdown includes Firestorm, Aquaman, Captain Marvel, Mary Marvel, Doctor Doom, Thor, Iron Man, Black Lightning, Hawkgirl and more. I did more the clean-shaven Jim Aparo Aquaman for the cover instead of the design they did for the actual cartoon. I still think it looks pretty cool.

If there's any interest, maybe I'll post the PDF so you can print your own for those of you who have kids who might enjoy it.

Click on any image to embiggen.

Clipping Mask

Look, it's page nine. And, it's a silent panel. I worry that I rely too much on dialogue, so I like when I can work silent panels in.

Plus, this one was had a difficulty level to it. Trying to get Mark's hands to make the shape of a mask, given how cartoony his hands and face proportions are, took some work. I even played fast and loose with the shadows. Technically, Mark's eyes should be in shadow too, but they're not, since I wanted the contrast between his hands and eyes to make things clearer to read.

I knocked it out quickly for the cover, but I do really like Abby's superhero outfit. I feels like a retro-Lois Lane-gets super powers outfit, which works well for this storyline.

Paper Dolls

This is one of my favorite segements of the new issue. Abby has to design and select a costume after what could best be described as a "wardrobe malfunction". Not much more I can say about it until you read it, but many oxes will be gored.

And with that accomplished, it's time to put up my tree!

A Man's Gotta Do What a Man's Gotta Do

Guess who won the Doctor Horrible fansite gift tag design contest?

Yup, it's me. So now I get fame and accolades, as well as a copy of the spiffy Dr. Horrible DVD set, which is of the awesome. Thanks to all who voted! I was up against some stiff competition, which you can see on the site here.

Contest Up

Over at the Doctor Horrible fansite, they've posted the finalists for the gift tag contest, and Your Humble Blogger is among the finalists. Go over to the blog and check out the entries yourself, though. There are a lot of great ones. You can even vote for your favorite.

These Are Not the Hammer

So, the Dr. Horrible peeps are having a contest for the artistically-inclined to design a gift tag for people whose Dr. Horrible Sing-Along-Blog hasn't arrived in time for Christmas. I've decided to enter the contest, so here's my tag design…

Yeah, I know I'm reusing art from that Captain Hammer and Penny illo I did back in Texas, but gosh darn, it came out so well. Besides, it's Christmas and I'm busy with all of that, as well as actually doing work and a little thing called Love and Capes, so I think I'm entitled to a little repurposing.

Besides, I had to write the song parody lyrics myself. That's original, right (except, of course, by definition).

The contest ends today. I'll let you know if I get any love from the judges.

The One Where I Almost Show Too Much

Because 'tis the Season, I'm giving you two whole panels of page seven. Of course, they stretch together into one. Here, Abby starts to see the upside of her powers.

This sequence has been fun to write. It's also the first time I've bumped my head against the "kid-friendly" FCBD edict. Now, Love and Capes is, was, and always will be kid friendly, but since this issue has to be okayed by Diamond after some questionable content got into one of the 2007 books, I'm playing it a little safer.

It's the payoff to a joke, though, so I can't show you. Not until it comes out. It's just the kind of thing I might have drawn slightly differently had this been part of the regular run of the book. Don't worry, though, it's still funny.